Polish psychiatrist dismisses fears of PTSD-affected Ukrainian veterans flooding Poland

Police warn about returning veterans

Commentary on the expected end of the war in Ukraine has increasingly focused on what it could mean for Poland. Former soldiers and police officers have pointed to the large volume of weapons on the black market that could reach criminal groups, as well as to veterans suffering from PTSD.

Police chief gen. insp. Marek Boroń has said that Ukrainians who fought at the front will travel to their families in Poland once the fighting ends. He said the authorities need to prepare for whether, and how, those people can function in ordinary life away from the front, and he expects some of them to have mental health problems.

We have to prepare for whether, and how, they are able to function in the normal world outside the front.

Boroń's remarks were answered by Radosław Tworus, head of the Clinic of Psychiatry, Combat Stress and Psychotraumatology at the Military Institute of Medicine. Speaking to PAP, Tworus said the feared arrival of 'shot-up boys' with PTSD who would rape and set up mafias is unrealistic, including from a clinical standpoint.

Psychiatrist rejects the mass-influx scenario

Tworus explained that withdrawal from social life, along with avoidance of places and situations linked to the traumatic event, is one of the symptoms of PTSD. Based on this, he argued that the image of veterans roaming the streets is hard to square with the condition.

It is hard to imagine thousands of veterans with PTSD running around the streets with Kalashnikovs, because these are exactly the situations they will try to forget.

If such veterans did come to Poland, Tworus said, they would make up a small percentage of arrivals. He said he was not worried about that scenario at all.

Where the real risk lies

Tworus said the bigger risk could come from people who were already emotionally or personality disturbed before the war. Fighting gave them extra opportunity for violence without punishment, and the war further desensitized them to death and killing. He said such former soldiers, looking for adrenaline, could appear in Poland after the war and form criminal organizations.

As an example of a similar phenomenon, he cited the Soviet Union after its war in Afghanistan. He said Poland should prepare for this, in particular by tightening its borders and considering a system for registering people who cross them.

Online fears framed as Russian psychological warfare

In Tworus's assessment, the internet's vision of PTSD-affected veterans threatening Poland stems from social fear. He said that fear is fed by manipulation tied to Russia's psychological war, and that its aim is to weaken Polish willingness to support Ukraine in its fight against the occupier.

What PTSD is

Tworus described PTSD as a treatable disorder that appears after an extreme experience involving a direct threat to life. He said such an experience stays in the head and, after some time, starts to work. PTSD was first identified in the early 1980s, mainly by American psychiatrists studying veterans. It is not confined to combatants, and it can affect soldiers and civilians in a conflict zone alike.